“And day to day, life’s a hard job, you get tired, you lose the pattern. You need distance, interval. The way to see how beautiful the earth is, is to see it as the moon.” – (The Dispossessed, p. 190)
Hello all!
I’ve just returned from my six-week trip to Nepal. To be quite honest, I had no idea what we were getting ourselves into, but it turned out to be a fantastic trip, full of opportunities to explore varied landscapes, immerse in local cultures, and be exposed to very different worldviews. Nepal gave me a chance to break away from the routine, to see things from another vantage point, and to build appreciation and understanding not only for others, but for myself. At the expense of sounding clichéd, I suppose that can be attributed to the transformative power of travel: One can’t help but see the world a little differently afterwards, to come away slightly changed.
What those changes are and how they will affect me I can’t say. What I do know is that my experiences will take some time to process. I was fortunate to have the time to take notes and photos along the way, and as such have found a few themes I would like to weave personal Ekostories around. Here are several potential ones:
Islands of respite in a chaotic world.
Aesthetics of the natural and artificial.
Conflicts between the romantic and the real.
A people’s bond with the land.
It will take me a while to put my thoughts down in a coherent manner. In the meantime, I will be back to updating weekly with new stories that I still have in the backlog. So stay tuned, and thanks for reading!
Reference
Le Guin, Ursula K. The Dispossessed. New York: HarperCollins, 1974.
Ekostories 
Your trip sounds and looks beautiful! Glad to have you back and look forward to hearing more about the trip over time! 🙂
Thanks very much Karen! It’s good to be back. I have a lot of catching up to do.
Isaac, wonderful pics. We visited that area a couple of years ago.
Thanks Holly. Which part of Nepal did you get a chance to visit?
We were around the area of Darjeeling, Sikkum. Not quite Nepal, but the people spoke Nepalese. My husband, from India, did his seminary there and had learned to speak Nepalese. Not sure if I’m spelling that correct. So beautiful! We had a so much fun….watching the sun come up over the Kanganajunga (sp) from Tiger Hills. What an experience. I’d love to go back.
That sounds amazing. We didn’t have a chance to travel east of Kathmandu, which is where Darjeeling is located, but I must admit, I was caught off-guard by the beauty and diversity of landscapes in that part of the world.
Just amazing! I have some photos around on my blog from those places. My husband lived there for three years.
looks wonderful. that’s quite a list of topics to weave into stories. looking forward to it.
Sounds like a wonderful trip and look forward to hearing more about it. Like your developing themes too.